April 25, 2024
DULUTH — A move to fully online won’t be the only change for Go Georgia, the annual church leadership training event sponsored by the Georgia Baptist Mission Board.
“We are very excited about the new name of the event,” said Scott Sullivan, director of the conference and Discipleship catalyst of the GBMB Church Strengthening team. "With the move to online due to coronavirus concerns and the conference’s reach beyond Georgia, a name change was needed.”
On Aug. 28 videos of keynote speakers and breakout sessions will be time-released throughout the day for individuals, churches, or associations who register prior to that date at TheSparkConference.com. Those who register before Aug. 28 will have free access to content from Aug. 29-Sept. 22.
Three keynote speakers will be featured at the training. They are International Mission Board President Paul Chitwood, Senior Pastor Robby Gallaty of Long Hollow Baptist Church in Hendersonville, Tenn., and a third who will be named in the coming weeks. Breakout sessions will cover areas such as discipleship, evangelism, children, students, women, worship and music, missions, culture, and pastoral wellness. Specific topics of those sessions can be found at TheSparkConference.com.
The Georgia-hosted annual training event is anticipating churches from its six partnership state conventions to take advantage of the resources. Those conventions, announced last month, are New York, New England, Pennsylvania/South Jersey, Michigan, Utah/Idaho, and Puerto Rico.
Sullivan pointed out that the conference’s format allows the flexibility for groups to use as it best suits their needs.
“Individuals can register and view the sessions on their own. Associations can host a live, face-to-face event for their churches or leaders or simply provide the content to their churches without hosting an event. Local churches can use it for their leaders. The videos can be accessed for a one-day event, provide training for bivocational leaders to best suit their schedules, or even spread out over several weeks.
“You can choose to use all the breakouts or only select ones. The point is,” he stressed, “you can develop your training that best fits your needs!”
All the sessions and keynote sessions will be pre-recorded, Sullivan added, with a live Q&A taking place on Aug. 28 among keynote speakers. A time for that event will be forthcoming.
After Sept. 22, access to all the materials will be available for a year at different price levels. An individual can purchase the training for $10. A church will be able to provide access to its members for $29. Associations can do the same for all its churches and members for $99.
